


This Message Will Repeat

by ClockworkArceus



Series: What Happened Afterwards [2]
Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire | Pokemon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire Versions
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-19
Updated: 2019-04-19
Packaged: 2020-01-16 10:48:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18519904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkArceus/pseuds/ClockworkArceus
Summary: With his plan to change the world for the better completely out the window and the end of the world quite literally on the horizon, Maxie returns to his team with the intention of explaining what he's done...and maybe winning back their trust.But is everything going to go as expected?





	This Message Will Repeat

Maxie had convinced himself he would get used to this.   
  
The streets of Lilycove were empty. The alleyways were the only places anything gathered - the Taillow that once hung around the cafes and shopping centres were littered in the shade, and Shroomish gathered on the one patch of dirt that wasn’t lit by the sun, piling on top of each other like they’d been dumped there.   
  
The creatures only moved when they breathed. Some, not even that.   
  
The gleaming white tiles had turned into mirrors reflecting the faintly red sunlight, the glare blinding Maxie whenever he tried to work out where his base was - let alone where he was meant to get into it?   
Would it be better now to just run? Check into a hotel and hope they didn’t recognise him? Hope and pray that the grunts didn’t try and get ahold of him?   
...Or that Tabitha and Courtney didn’t get the same idea?   
  
He  _ tried  _ to convince himself he could get used to this.   
  
The light wasn’t getting any easier to bear with time, was it? The little burns on his forehead and chin kept getting more painful. He barely kept his eyes fully open for more than a few seconds at a time now - but the huge circle that was apparently the sun was printed there, even when they were closed.   
  
Even he would succumb eventually.    
  
The headache would come first, then the dry skin, the quickening heartbeat, the shallow, rapid breathing, the nausea, finally the coma - what was it that Courtney had said over the phone? That her head was burning up?    
Was it possible to skip over headache and dry skin, and go straight to the heartbeat and hyperventilating?   
  
So, like everything else, Maxie was hiding. Pulling his coat tightly around him, he tried to make himself small in the alleyway. As he waited for an opportunity to run.   
  
He pressed the little button on the side of his glasses - after a few seconds, the lenses turned black, and quickly checking to see if anyone else was there -    
  
He broke cover.   
  
To say the sun had suddenly gotten brighter was a bit of an understatement. Around an hour ago, he’d been standing in a cave on the seafloor, talking about how the world was going to be saved, thinking about how the world was going to know his name, maybe even have a Nobel Prize to his name by the end of the year and…   
Awakening that creature in the pool of lava.   
  
No, Tabitha had come in first, hadn’t he? He said something, something about how he was going to end the world, and Maxie had...somewhat tuned it out like all the other times people had said that exact thing.    
Tuned out, apart from the things about him not needing to do this.. And the things about him never listening to anyone and never letting anyone listen to him.    
  
About how he had known basically  _ half  _ the plan -  _ his _ plan before getting bundled into a submarine.   
  
_ Well, of course you know only half the plan, _ he said, not making any point at all.   
  
But the look in Groudon’s eyes he remembered. And looking back, he didn’t know why he thought they’d look more like marbles, glass things that only reflected the Red Orb. Yet in person they focused like a human’s eyes, blinking out dust - widening when they saw the light above and  _ glittering _ .   
Then, the sun exploded.    
  
It spread itself across the sky, into the water, onto his eyes,  _ into  _ them. The world started ever-so-slowly fading to white as steam from the shallow water they stood in filled the air...   
He felt all the eyes on that little sandbar they stood on boring into his back.   
  
Tabitha left after that. Courtney, he hadn’t heard from. They were probably still at the base, probably wondering where he might be.   
And hopefully still willing to talk to him.   
  
The sand-dune behind him was left dotted with his footprints, but, by this point, Maxie didn’t care. He stood at the back door of his own base, embedded in a rocky outcrop overlooking the sea. (Well, overlooking what  _ would  _ have been the sea.)   
With a swift tug on what  _ looked _ like a daisy, a chunk rock slowly shifted backwards, revealing a sanitised white hall. Shadows of grunts could be seen in the distance, darting past windows like bees in a hive. Chattering, raising their voices over the sound of thumping feet.    
  
Not one of them saw the doorway that had just popped out of nowhere, and after Maxie had sidled in, and slammed the door shut, he sighed with relief and continued on his way.   
  
The base hummed with the sound of a thousand air-conditioners turned up to full blast, but the lights were out - someone had drained the lava tubes. (God, those would take forever to fill back up.) Again, Maxie walked in the shadows, checking his phone for anyone wanting to know what had just happened.   
  
Well, there was the one grunt wanting permission to come in late that day...

 

  
(The window showed the great hall below, filled with long, glittering white tables, decked with plates, and vases of flowers cultured from plastic, glass and metal. Each of them was labelled with the name of a grunt, and a little outline of all the things they’d done to help the cause. Some of the grunts paused by their plate - some even took a flower with them.)   
  
The one text from Tabitha.   
_ “hey can you meet me at the cave entrance?” _ __  
__  
(Above was a white banner, painted by Tabitha himself - “welcome to a new age!” it said. The others that were draped across doors read things like “congratulations!” and, one that was painted by a grunt…”the time is 0 AM.”)   
  
The one alert on his phone reminding him of a press conference he had scheduled for today.   
  
(Zero AM. AM…probably meant ’After Magma.’)   
  
He shuddered.   
  
Still, he kept going, taking a shortcut through the staff kitchen and the games room - all of them with one or two grunts cutting through them too. None noticed him, or cared to. The elevators were just around the corner, and as Maxie stepped inside one, he swore he saw another shadow cut across the floor behind him.    
  
And it stopped.   
It turned to look at him as the glass doors closed.    
It stayed there as the elevator left.    
  
So, as the floor below disappeared and the little sign above the door started counting up, Maxie took out his phone and tried to get his priorities in order: first priority was…getting Tabitha to talk, probably.   
He couldn’t do all of this alone, and how else would he know he was doing the right thing now? Other than his own intuition. And  _ that _ had been proven wrong.   
His number was right there, and he pressed the phone to his ear and waited for the tone; a tone that ended up not coming. Nothing but the sickening creak of an elevator that needed fixing.   
  
“Hello?” he said, quietly, “Is - “   
  
_ “Hi, you’ve reached Tabitha Yamashita, admin of Team Magma. I’m away from the phone at the moment, so please leave me a message or just email me. If this is a grunt calling, feel free to just show up at my office if we’re at work! Ta-ta!” _ __  
__  
The glass doors slid open, and Maxie immediately started to run, fast as you could run without making too much noise. Swallowing the lump in his throat and his pride, he started to speak -   
“Tabitha, it’s Maxie.”   
He paused, trying and failing to get the key in his office door, awkwardly holding up the phone to his ear -   
“I - “   
His voice broke.   
“I’m calling to let you know I will be getting all the grunts out of the base, and I will be shutting everything down. If you, by any chance, are still here, then...I suggest you leave. I will take care of everything I can, you understand?”   
Maxie stepped inside his office and clicked the door shut, double-checking it was locked.   
  
Taking the script of the press conference he was  _ supposed  _ to host, he read it through, looking for anything, anything he could salvage and use -   
  
_ “It will take approximately six months for the sea level to drop far enough. At that point, I will put Groudon back into its hypersleep, though it may be re-used if need be.” _ __  
_ If asked on beliefs - “Eventually, I have faith that Groudon will be viewed as a savior in popular culture, rather than a malevolent creature. It does not deserve that.” _ __  
__  
_ If asked on control - “This Red Orb can control Groudon completely, at no - “ _ __  
__  
“Actually, you’re probably already gone, aren’t you?” he corrected.   
The entire script tore in two, shredded and scattered in the vague direction of the rubbish bin. The pieces that fluttered onto the desk: slowly torn again. Again, and again, and again until he couldn’t read what he’d originally written.    
  
“Please, er - forgive me for assuming otherwise.”   
He sat down at his desk, booted up the PA system.    
  
“I understand that...you, ah, probably weren’t able to call me before because of all those people calling their friends and family. Clogging up the telephone lines and - and the like, it’s to be expected - “ he kept on talking, trying to find new things to say, “But I want to say that I’m sorry. I would have listened to you before if you had told me. I had everyone else’s interests in mind, and I hate this sun as much as you probably do - either way, I’m - I’m sorry. If you don’t want to come back, I can move everything out of your office and have it destroyed.”   
  
“But - Tabitha - you’re to  _ tell me _ immediately if you receive this message.”   
  
He ended the call, and put the phone down.   
  
A few seconds later -   
“Courtney?” he said, pressing the phone tightly to his ear, “Are you still in your office? I need you to leave the base immediately - I have everything taken care - “   
_ “Heeeey! Good news: you got the right number. This is Courtney Virtanen! Bad news: I can’t get to the phone so - “ _   
That was the end of that.   
So, leaving phone on the side of his desk, face up so he’d notice it if it rang, he turned on the PA system, pressed the buttons he never thought he’d have to press, rang the alarms he hoped he’d never have to ring, took everything he needed, left -    
  
_ “The Emergency Alert System has been activated. Every person currently in the base should listen to the following announcement.” _   
  
He decided he was going to be brave.   
  
_ “The Magma Base is currently being evacuated. If you choose to stay, you may be putting yourself in extreme danger. All facilities such as gas, heating, air conditioning, automatic doors, and lighting will be switched off once the base is fully evacuated.” _   
  
His office connected directly to a balcony above the main meeting hall. Surely now people would be looking to it, knowing that’s exactly what happened at 11 o'clock every day. The whole base was quiet now, every part of it was probably waiting with bated breath. Hoping for guidance.    
  
_ “Do not take your belongings. Do not take any projects you are currently working on. Only take PokeBalls that you currently have on hand - I repeat - only take PokeBalls that you currently have on hand.” _   
  
Hoping for actual instructions other than ‘run.’   
  
_ “Do not return to the base until further notice.” _   
  
This message he’d recorded sounded so calm.    
  
_ “This message will repeat until there are none to hear it. The Emergency Alert System has been activated. Every person currently in the base should listen to the following announcement. The Magma Base is currently being evacuated. If you choose to stay, you may be putting yourself in extreme danger. All facilities such as gas - “ _   
  
Ah, yes, the Three C’s he always tried to keep in mind when giving people bad news like this: cool, calm, and collected. Or was it cold, calm and collected?   
  
“ _ heating, air conditioning, automatic doors, and lighting will be switched off once the base is fully evacuated. Do not take your belongings - Do not take any projects you are currently working on. Only take PokeBalls that you currently have on hand - I repeat - only take PokeBalls that you currently have on hand - “ _   
  
He was going to tell Team Magma exactly what he had done wrong, and, more importantly,  _ far  _ more importantly, he was going to tell them everything he could now do right.   
(Should he be insincere? Honest?  _ Brutally _ honest? Uplifting? Defeatist? Apologetic? Collected?... _ Actually  _ honest? _ ) _   
  
_ “Do not return to the base until further notice. This message will repeat - ” _   
  
And so, as he rounded the corner, stepped up behind the lectern, and readied his papers, the leader of Team Magma, still composed and collected as the pre-recorded alarm, looked down on a crowd…   
  
**_“ - until there are none to hear it.”_ **   
  
...that didn’t exist.   
  
The hall was empty.    
  
There was no leftover movement. The doors were still, the giant LCD screens were dead. Nothing remained that wasn’t grey. Sanitised. Plastic.  _ Perfect.  _ __  
Now - now, the alleyways outside were where everything gathered - and the loving homes, the emergency shelters, where the families were and the friends - in other words, anywhere but here. It would make sense for anyone, it would make sense for everyone…   
  
But somehow Maxie still held his breath waiting for someone to arrive.   
  
“ _ If you choose to stay, you may be putting yourself in extreme - “ _ __  
The calm voice echoed, and echoed, in emptiness, in silence - the room, the heart of the base, grew to twice its size in the absence of anyone speaking, or asking, or anything, for that matter. He was just so used to being talked to, constantly, nowadays.   
Being looked up to now, but...now?   
  
It was just Maxie, and his speech.    
  
Him, and a pile of paper.    
  
He shut off every speaker in the base, sick of hearing himself talk and talk, and remained, frozen in place behind the lectern.    
  
Unsure of what to do now that no-one was here to listen to him, he waited, and waited. Only moving when he breathed. The breathing turned to barely-noticeable shivering - yet...he still kept staring at the empty room. Specifically, the door.   
  
The lights were the first to go.    
  


 

**Author's Note:**

> So, here's a warm-up piece that I really enjoyed writing, alongside the other one! There is an accompanying fic that details what happened to Archie, called 'Something Good', which I kind of...wrote to parallel this one.
> 
> (I'm in a weird situation. Loneliness is one of my favourite moods to write about, but I feel like it's easier to write when there's characters talking...?)
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it anyway, and please give me any feedback you have - I'd love to hear it!


End file.
